Gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD) can occur in children. Unfortunately, some of these children have such severe GERD that it cannot be managed with medication. These children may benefit from anti-reflux surgery. Neurologically impaired (NI) children may have a severe form of GERD with emetic reflux. The standard anti-reflux surgery, Nissen Fundoplication (NF), is less effective in NI children and NI treatment can lead to other complications and a relatively high failure rate. An alternative anti-reflux surgery, gastroplasty with restricted antrum to control emesis (GRACE), has been developed in an animal model. This surgery can be more effective than NI in controlling reflux emesis.
Known surgical staplers are used to deploy at least two parallel rows of staples from a proximal end of the jaws of the staplers to the distal end. A knife blade can divide the tissue between two adjacent rows to provide a stapled division of tissue. However, conventional staplers are not suitably configured to safely and/or optimally perform the GRACE procedure.